SNOWSHINE

Chapter 10

       Brian's heart beat fast as one by one his former friends walked through the door. He felt the way one typically does when one has not seen friends or relatives for a long time, kind of excited and a sense of wonder about how they have changed, either for the better or the worst in your absence. He also felt a kind of dread, the way a prisoner must feel when he sees the jury coming back with a decision.

       Unfortunately, they all seemed to have changed for the worse, at least where it came to him. They all marched grimly inside and stared at him with either indifference (Debbie, Emmett, Blake, Ted, and Gus) or open hostility and loathing. (Lindsay and Michael)

       Double G and Vixen came in first and sat together followed by Red, Whiny, the Accountant, the Exterminator, and finally Swish Stick who had to bend a little to get in the door. They all took a seat and looked at him as if they expected him to say something but didn't really care what it was, or as I said, like something they had scraped off the bottom of their shoe.

       There was a pause as Brian took in their indifference and hostility.

       He cleared his throat and said: "I suppose you don't believe this, but it's really good to see you all again. Emmett, you're looking great. Ted...You too. You're so...different. What happened to you?"

       Ted walked with a swagger, was bigger in the chest and arms than Brian remembered but otherwise was the same old Ted. Except that he now wore full leather, boots, jeans, chaps, skin-tight gloves, black wifebeater and a leather jacket. He wore a Muir cap on his head. Blake was dressed more conservatively but sported a black leather studded collar which Ted fingered constantly.

       "Tell ya later," he said bluntly, "When a certain someone has gone back to the Playroom!"

       "Awww, Uncle Ted!!" whined Gus.

       "Awww yourself, with bells on! Sorry little man! There are some reindeer games you're just not ready to hear about yet." He hooked a finger through Blake's  collar and pulled slightly. "Right Bo - uh - Blake?

       "Yes Ted," answered Blake simply.

       "Where've you been Bri?" asked Emmett bluntly. He wasn't angry with him but he wasn't impressed either and he figured it would be healthy to get off this thread of conversation for the sake of Gus.

       "I - I've been here...well, Pittsburgh I mean. I just outgrew Babylon...started my own company...started running in different circles. I didn't mean to lose touch, I just started working a lot. Well, OK...to be honest, I worked constantly.  After a while, I just reached the stage where I figured we had all lost touch, our lives went into different directions. But I never meant to consciously ignore or abandon you!"

       "Different directions indeed!" sneered Michael, "While we continued to stand up for queers and Liberty Avenue and Liberty Avenues everywhere, you  sold out and became...this!" He gestured up and down and Brian's Armani corporate image. "Spoiled and selfish...Straight acting! A self-hating queer! A tool for the wholesome and "righteous", (he air quoted viciously) The ultimate hetero homophobic bigot!"

       "No! No! It's not like that! Really, it's..." he trailed off when he realized that's exactly what it was like.

       The rest of them stared at him silently except Whiny who continued to live up to his name.

       "To think...We were once friends! I respected you! I idolized you! And now look at you! You make me sick!"

       "Michael! That's enough!" said Justin sharply.

       Michael looked resentful but he backed down and shut up.
       "But I didn't mean for it to be like that!" Brian continued, "I may be straight acting but I'm NOT self hating! As for Stockwell, he was just another client, just another product to sell! But then he just became more and more evil, and wrote that disgusting Proposition 14 and nothing I could do or say would dissuade him from it! But I never wrote it, I swear! I had no idea he...I mean he just...I just came in one day and there it was all typed up and ready to go and him all smug and superior. I read it and wanted to hurl! Oh God!" he cried out to a Deity he still didn't really believe in, "I didn't know what to do! I still don't! I hate him! I hate him so much! But I'm under his thumb as much as everybody else! If I ever told anybody what he's done...What he wants to do...he'd have me shot!" He put his elbows on the table and put his head into his hands. His forehead was shiny with sweat. His eyes were shiny with tears he refused to shed.

       All the D.W.A.R.V.E.S could see he was in earnest and were affected in some way. Double G was a bit more trusting then the rest of them and wanted to help the handsome man who said he was his Daddy. Of course, he'd never had a Daddy before, not since Gee-Yaawmm and he was almost too young to remember him anyway. In his little boy way, he wanted  Brian to be in earnest so he could trust him. But the part of him that was smart knew he had to wait for everyone else as well.

       Red's eyes were as shiny as Brian's and were starting to leak as well.

       The Accountant and Exterminator were cold, assessing, calculating his body language, his shiny forehead and other signs that he could be faking or lying as only master analytical technicians could. At last they looked at each other.

       "What do you think?" they asked at the same time.

       "He is in earnest," they answered at the same time.

       Swish Stick just sniffed and brought out a hankie.

       "I'm not saying I believe you," said Vixen, "I still don't trust you. And I still don't want you around GusGus but if you are in earnest - and that's a pretty big IF - then you won't have any objections to telling US these terrible things. This is a closed room. If you want to join us, then you won't have any objections to trusting us and sharing what you know. Trust us and we'll trust you. But you'll have to go first."

       "I agree with Mother," said Double G, "I want to trust you too but we all will need some time to adjust to how we think of you. It seems you have changed just as much as the rest of us. However..." Here he slid down from his conference chair and toddled on his little boy legs on a looooong circuit of the conference table. It took a long time. There was dead silence and all eyes in the room were fixed on him. Finally he came around to the opposite side of the table to where Brian was sitting and patted his knee signalling that he wanted to sit there. In rapturous joy, Brian lifted him up and sat him upon his lap. "However," he continued, "I will decide whether or not I am to spend any time with MY Daddy! Do not forbid us, not after the Gee-Yawwwmm debacle!" He fixed defiant eyes upon Vixen's furious ones but she finally nodded and backed down.

       "What happened with Guillaume?" Brian asked, "He didn't hurt you, did he?"

       "Well, not exactly...Not in the way you mean, I mean," answered Double G, "He never hit me. In fact, it's to a point where I barely remember him. He just...ignored me. At first, it was at the dinner table or when other grown ups were around, but eventually more and more, I just wasn't there for him any more. I was treated like no more than a table lamp or one of those god awful ceramic knick-knacks that littered the rooms there. I was in the room...but inconsequential like...well like a lamp, like I said. And in some ways that hurt me more than if he'd kicked me around."

       "Well, I will never ignore you," promised Brian, enfolding the boy in his large, long arms, "Or hurt you."

       "Oh come on! Don't be fooled! Don't tell me you are ALL taking this all in!" Whiny cried furiously. He was the only one unaffected by Brian's declarations and considered it one big performance.

       "Oh SHUT UP, WHINY!" they all yelled in unison.

       Whiny pursed his lips in a straight line, and sat back in his chair, stiff backed and stiff necked. Suddenly, he could stand no more and without a word, he pushed back from the table and exited the room, slamming the door behind him.

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       For a few moments there was a tense silence. Then there was a collective sigh of relief and it was as if everyone's shoulders relaxed at the same time and the atmosphere was a good deal happier as the eggshells that had been on the floor were, at last, swept away.

       In spite of being relieved, Snowshine could not help the pang of guilt that swept through him as well.

       "Oh dear!" he murmured, "Perhaps we pushed him a little too far! I'd better have a talk with him later."

       "Bah!" said his mother, "He's given us a lot of grief and pushed at us as well! He deserves anything he's gotten! This will be a good wake up call to get in line and stop being a stupid contrarian prick!"

       "Still...after all he's been through..."said Snowshine.

       "But what happened? What on earth happened to him to make him this way?" cried Brian in great distress.
       "Michael's had a hard life since you've been gone, Brian," Red explained. "He's stuck in a miserable job at the Big Q that he hates. He's never had a steady boyfriend. He got trapped in with this girl at the Big Q and...well, he needs to tell you that. He called you a straight acting, self-hating queer because that's what he's become himself. We told you...he has a lot of issues and it's apparent they revolve around you a great deal."

       "Me? But he hates me! He nearly killed me!"

       "No Bri! He loves you! But he's MAD at you! You have to look at it from our point of view. You were best friends since you were 14! You were both party boys until one day you just never showed up at Babylon! You just stopped going! You were never home! You quit Vanguard. Your cell phone was disconnected. I don't even think you had a landline and if you did, no one knew the number. I remember he went to Babylon all night for two weeks straight in the hopes you'd show up. But you never did. After that, he stopped going as well. Well, regularly, I mean. And not for your benefit. And once that thing with...well, that's for him to tell. But eventually he stopped going altogether and his moods never really moved past angry or sad or annoyed or depressed and back to angry ever again," explained Ted.

       "I remember that..." whispered Brian, "I remember that last night where I was on my way out and I thought...What for? What the hell am I doing?...And staying home that night. And then the next night...And then the next...And then...I just fell into a new routine. I bought out Vanguard that next day. Spent a lot of time after that poaching clients. I went out of town a lot so I cut off my phone. The cell was the company's so I had to give it back and get a new one. I was so busy I never even thought to give it to you guys. All that mattered was looking good and getting clients and starting my company. All that mattered...was me. My God, what a self centered bastard I was! I just forgot. I forgot about everything that wasn't in front of my nose. I forgot about all of you....about everyone. I'm so sorry!"

       Everyone, even Lindsay albeit grudgingly, accepted his apology and you could feel the opinion of him in the room rise another couple of points.

       Snowshine smiled one of his sun-glancing-off-the-snow brilliant smiles.

       "Now you begin to see," he told everyone, "Now you see what I saw when we met and went out. He has changed. He is changing." He grasped Brian's hand. "More and more you are becoming self aware. More and more you are becoming perfect. Soon you will be perfect. And you will be my Prince."

       "Aren't I already?" Brian asked with a lop-sided smile that made Justin's dick twitch.

       "You are my beloved," Justin answered quite seriously, "But you are not yet...ready...to be my Prince."

       "What must I do?" asked Brian just as seriously.

       "Continue to change. Try this apology out on Michael...and hope that will break the curse he has inflicted upon himself...and everyone else. Oh...and slay a dragon."

       "A dragon huh!? That's a tall order," said Brian, tongue in cheek.

       "Not so tall. There is one even now, trying to become mayor."
       "Ahhhhhh," said Brian in understanding.

       Ted cleared his throat. "I'm sooo sorry," he drawled, "Should we leave you two alone?"

       The two jumped and snapped back to reality. Justin colored.

       "Sorry," he said sheepishly, "Now...where were we?"

       "Brian was about to spill his guts about Stockwell so we can end this once and for all," said Ted, quite seriously.

       "Oh, right...OK, Brian...you're on," said Justin.

       Ted turned on a digital recorder. And hesitantly at first but then gaining momentum, Brian began to speak.

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       One hour later...

       With a shaking finger, Ted pressed the button on the recorder again to turn it off. It took him two tries to do it but he managed it at last.

       Snowshine and the other D.W.A.R.V.E.S. were in similar states of shock, stupefaction, and horror. Brian had told them tales of corruption, greed, blackmail, murder and worse that had everybody wide eyed. Deb swore that underneath her wig, her hair had curled and considered it a miracle that her wig hair hadn't straightened.

       "Now..." Brian said shakily, "Now...you understand."

       "My God!" Lindsay breathed, "I mean, I thought he was just a homophobic bigot but this is so much worse. He doesn't care who he walks over! He's a monster!"

       "Completely," Brian agreed.

       "We've got to stop the Assh - uh, A-hole! Sorry sweetie," said Deb to Gus.

       "We can't. I told you, there's no proof. He's very careful with that. He never leaves a paper trail. Not one that leads back to him anyway. He`s ruined many a man by scapegoating them. Otherwise, he has the dirty workers killed. Often he does it himself. He gets a sick kind of pleasure out of doing it."

       "Like he did with Ethan," Justin mused.

       Brian ran his fingers through his sweaty hair and let out a ragged sigh. He nodded.

       "No. I refuse to believe it," said Justin firmly, "In all my experience with murderers and criminals, one common trait is that they always keep proof! Keepsakes. Trophies. They may be newspaper clippings. Bits of cothing. Tapes. Something. And all we have to do is find them. Exterminator...can you put a wire onto Brian? Bug him the way Stockwell tried to bug him to hear us?"

       "I can," said Blake simply.

       "Then, Brian, that will be your main objective. We are going to send you back out into the world, with one objective. Find those trophies, wherever they may be or get Stockwell to admit something to you. We will be listening and recording all the time."

       "That is going to be harder now since he knows I have discovered him," said Brian. "Ever since his bugs were destroyed and I've been off his grid, he's not going to trust me as much as he did before."

       "Nevertheless, you must try," encouraged Justin, "But in the meantime, we're going to be working on a Plan B."

       "Which is?" Ted asked for the group.

       "If we cannot prove anything legally, then we must destroy him politically. He must not be allowed to run unopposed any longer. This monster can not be elected.

       "But how?" Brian asked, "I told you what he had over Deakins. He'll never agree to run again."

       "No, that's true. I had something else in mind. Another candidate must arise, one who he cannot reach, one who he cannot blackmail. It's time I came out of hiding. I will do it. I will join the race and run against Stockwell."

TBC